Where The Roads End
The Polar Bear Express rushed through the winter forest. Trees lining both sides of the windows, branches covered in snow. There was a hush in the train of little ones on their devices and the rumbling of the engine. Kids played up and down the aisles, and laughter could be heard throughout the car. I sat on the window side beside my fiancé. We were making the trip to Moosonee, across the ice to Moose Factory Island to his little townhouse across the street from the Elementary School. A small community in the James Bay region of Canada, home of the Moose Cree First Nation. My fiancé is a teacher at the public school just off the Indigenous Reserve and I’d visited before. He had a history with its people. His grandfather had worked in this Northern Community and was well known for working for the Ministry of Natural Resources. There was even a street named after him and the older generation remembered him even though my fiancé lost his grandfather at the young age of 3 years old. But the echoes of his time there in the North seemed almost legendary. He sounded like a man who was a pillar to the community who did photography, bought winter coats for those who couldn’t afford it and even entertained the ladies. My fiancé is white, English- and Italian on his father’s side. His parents had split when he was 7. He grew up with his mom and brother while his dad worked overseas in Italy and remarried.
In March of 2022, S had surprised me in Toronto with his proposal. I was blind sighted since we were not at all dating at the time. But when you live in one of these Northern Communities, life seems to stall for years. Your family and loved ones, though life is happening, you only get to visit with them in the Summertimes, Christmas and sometimes March Break. So, S and I got engaged and he brought me back with him from March Break as his fiance.
He and I met in 2019 at a Whisky /Music cafe in Kingston, Ontario on the serendipitous day of June 8th after promising myself that I would make friends or meet someone (fingers crossed) and tear myself away from the church. Since my arrest in 2015 and again in 2017, St. Mary’s Cathedral became my hide away for Schizoaffective Disorder.
I’d come back to Kingston from my University days, to revisit my B.A. and upgrade to Honours. That means I would upgrade a 3 year degree to a 4 year, but when my chronic illness shook me, I had to withdraw from year 4 of my program. Despite my active symptoms and lack of medicine because I didn’t know any better, I would go to afternoon masses with the elderly and even went to a couple Bible Studies. I don’t think Church is unhealthy but it can be challenging to schizophrenics and I was very symptomatic and was hearing voices on the regular.
S was bringing me up North with him where I could live and recover and just be myself.
The backyard had big trees and overlooked a red shed in the neighbours yard. I used to sit out there and cry from the stress of my past with homelessness, incarceration and admittance to the psych ward. I felt so incredibly overwhelmed that this man wanted to have me around. It’s true, that’s not a great thing to think of yourself, but I knew only from other people I’d ever dated or been friends with, that they’d leave me behind.
They incarcerated me pregnant so I decided while I was at the hospital for forensics that I would get an abortion. It was my decision. I wasn’t going to carry this pregnancy to term. I went with a nurse to an abortion clinic to do the procedure and speak to a doctor. The procedure was free. I didn’t want to be glued to Brian the ganster and have a child that they would most likely take away from me. I had no idea what the future held for my sentence or for a child that might be delivered while incarcerated.
S was different and it seemed that I could finally breathe. I could finally relax. I wasn’t symptom free, but I felt safe. Finally. After many years of neglect and being mixed with drug communities during homelessness, I was free. In Moose Factory Island I had room to be myself again.
I was according to the standards in International Law, tortured in solitary confinement. My lawyer was trying to get me a room in the 'State of The Art’ Psychiatric Hospital where I would be assessed for mental illness. But I was in the jail for 2 weeks. According to International Law you are entitled to 2 hours of social time with a counsellor and 4 hours of outdoor time, e v e r y d a y. And as I said, I was pregnant and they had left me in the cell for 2 weeks in which I put pee on my face to supplement for face cream because I thought that the peptides would nourish my skin. I dunno… You’re probably wondering what my crime was. So here it goes. ‘Dangerous Operation of Motor Vehicle’ and ‘Mischief x 2’. My boyfriend at the time, was yelling at me on this one particular day. He told me he stole his house from his ex-wife and pushed me around, admitting that he’d beat up his ex. He was 6”5. And after I announced that I was pregnant, respect seemed torture. He was a total gangster. He had been charged with assault for almost ‘killing a guy’- his words. He also said that he’d left his ex wife with a motorcycle gang in some basement apartment because she was a ‘slut’. On top of that, they weren’t legally divorced and shared health insurance. And on this particular day… after yelling at me that I was inferior, for whatever reason, I asked him to leave my apartment in downtown Oshawa. I suddenly felt that I’d made a mistake. A very big mistake.
At first he presented himself as a nice small town guy, who loved his dog and his son who was 9. He played for a Baseball league and wanted more kids. I was alone mostly except for a few party friends and one church friend from youth group. So I let this guy in. Brian, we’ll call him. Brian at first seemed like an okay guy. He’d invite me over and he’d play guitar for me and sung. He was into the Blues and singers like Robert Johnson. I liked that about him. But boy oh boy did I not know what I was signing up for. He would yell at me and tell me about his penis size being bigger than other men and how pathetic other men were. He sent me awful texts and on one occasion told me that, and I saved the screenshot of the text, that “Nobody cares about anything you have to say they just wanted to f*** you. What you have won’t last long and I have so many ways to get women. Piss off.” And I was completely lost. So that night I went over to his house and picked up the garden gnome and broke it across his minivan. As far as I’m concerned it was my garden gnome too. If I’m pregnant with your child whats yours is mine. I got into my car and drove away. When I reached home the police were already there. Instead of stopping to talk to them outside my apartment, I decided that if i were to get arrested, I wanted Brian to see me go down. So, I fled from the Police to his house where Brian saw me chased and handcuffed by the Police for failing to stop. He was laughing. That’s what abuse does. It causes schizophrenia. Even though I was carrying his child, they allowed him to put a retraining order on me. It’s safe to say I didn’t know what it was like to be loved by a man. My old life was turned upside down. I tried sending people messages on Facebook and Instagram. I’d often get no answers or texts back. People were too busy as far as I understood to care about me or my palpable problems.
That night that I asked Brian to leave, I knew it was over. He had seen something in me that he hated and there was no turning back. Was I more worldly than he was? He’d only left Canada once in his life. I’d gotten an education at Queens Castle in Herstmonceaux, England. I was an Honour Roll student. I was an All Star Athlete. I was a dancer for 15 years and was first soloist in our ballet production. I was awarded Teacher Appreciation Award. Athlete of the year. I was respected at the time by my peers. I was a French immersion student. I was completely empowered. But when I started dating, people seemed to let go. I think it was honour shaming to be honest. That’s when girls are shamed for their choices and it usually happens in very conservative cultures by their fathers. They can only assume who I was sexually active with because I never talked about dating with anyone really. And there were boys I never had sex with, just went on a couple dates with. And back in the days before illness I got to say no and have a clean break. But my good girl reputation went out the window the moment my peers considered me to be ‘growing up’. I knew the important things, I thought. To find someone who loved me eclipsed any world tour they’d ever seen me on.
Moosonee was a place the roads ended. You could only reach the community by train or fly in. And Moose Factory, the Island town was a place you took a Water Taxi to get to. It was a remote community but a beautiful place. The Moose River was lined with islands that were uninhabited. The Indigenous peoples of the area were friendly. They were used to white people coming to work up there since the Hudson Bay Company established itself in the 1600’s. Some of the indigenous people were artists, a lot were outdoors people, and some liked getting their nails done just like typical Canadian women and drove pick up trucks, went to the gym and worked hard everyday at the schools and hospitals. But sitting on that back porch was a place away from it all where I could dare to feel. I felt overwhelmed. But I felt blessed that I’d finally found someone who loved me.
